


Attachment Theory

by coldho



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: F/F, Not a healthy relationship, in sum I just think Michael would look really good in the pirate ruffly shirt/tight pants outfit, its like if two stoic tsunderes dated. I hate that I know what that word means., it’s the Trauma and also they’re both just Assholes with no redeeming qualities, like just the Worst communication, oh also purple prose and Fake Deep Philosophizing YIKES, she already pulled off the ruffly shirt in episode 6 lets just undo some buttons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:08:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23950588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coldho/pseuds/coldho
Summary: The sea is more open than Michael has ever been. It doesn't quite call to her, but pirating does.
Relationships: Beelzebub/Michael (Good Omens)
Kudos: 6





	Attachment Theory

**Author's Note:**

> I blasted thrift shop vitamin string quartet edition nonstop while writing this lol. Anyways what's cohesive formatting.

The 1700s smell somehow worse than the 1200s; she thought humanity would have gone forwards with their hygiene rather than backwards. But this is why She’s blessed them with Her assistance. Trust in the Almighty, etcetera, etcetera.

That’s why she’s here, after all.

Michael smooths the creases out of her breeches, pausing at the feel of smooth wings under one hand. The mid-summer air swelters, the brick underfoot split by yellowed roots and filled with what she wishes wasn’t manure but knows is based on the teaming clouds of thick black horseflies. The fly on her thigh would’ve left a greasy smear had she crushed it. Unlike the cherubs and the sweet nymphs that flutter their eternities away, she isn’t squeamish to blood. But the thought of one of His underlings so visibly sullying her form – well.

She supposes that that would not do.

-

For her, at least, it’s supposed to be an easy job. Gabriel had thought to assign it to the principality already stationed on Earth, but she’d argued. He may have a flaming sword, but he’s one for smarter jobs than this, ones that involve delicacy and diplomacy and invention. Best not to waste his talents on laying waste to a pirate ship and the dullard priest that had called for them.

It’s straightforward to have her in this job. She’d found no need to lie when she’d answered the call at the tavern that night, though the bearded man at the fireplace had scoffed when she’d walked up.

“Tall ain’t much for rigging,” he’d said, “Better be hiding some bulk under those sleeves.”

She’d hitched a brow and set a pile of papers on the table between them. Writing, she knew, was hard to come by.

When he paused, looked her up and down, she’d nodded.

“For good measure,” she’d said, and drew her sword. As she went through her stances, he’d hemmed.

“We leave tomorrow at dawn,” he’d agreed. “See if we got something for you.”

He was, she knew, bluffing. Michael knew that the first mate had been found on the streets that morning, head crushed into the pavement.

Debauchery and gluttony and pride were simply inexcusable.

-

The sun is barely up and yet the heat is still present, cloistering heavy. Sweat is already beginning to drip down Michael’s collar, tracing a shimmering streak down her neck. The buzz of flies is almost encompassing, draws to mind images of rats in the bilge and rotten fruit and flesh coating the cook’s knife. But there’s something more to the heat and the flies, something more to the decay that surrounds her. Her wings twinge in the space between worlds, but she doesn’t falter.

She can sense Beelzebub studying her from across the dock, can sense the demon making her slow way across.

“Just nipped up for a temptation,” Beelzebub says, almost blithe once she’s standing beside her. Her brows are crusted, though, frown burrowing. “Can’t trust the peons to get things right in a timely fashion. They’re always mucking about with the little things - don’t see the big picture.”

“Mm,” Michael says, raising her nose. “And yet you’re partial to creatures small,” she would tease. But instead she remains steadily aloof; she’s on the job, after all.

Beelzebub tilts her head back at her. “What brings you Down here, Michael? I can’t imagine you’ve just gotten bored with your job.”

“Of course not,” she says, pointedly ignoring the dig. “I have business I also need to attend to. The coalition between the more righteous of humanity’s forces and these…marauders - well,” she pauses, sighing deeply. “We must ensure the underlying virtue of the Church.”

Beelzebub stares up at her with eyes like stones, carefully smoothed over. “And who better than a general?”

Michael concedes a nod. Beelzebub’s frown twitches when she does **.**

**-**

“The helmsman came by,” Michael says when she reports to the Captain’s quarters a few days into the ship. “Sail's off to a smoother start than expected.”

“Good,” the Captain says, short as ever, “Walk with me.”

She lists off their luck with navigation as they go, the Captain shouting out what she knows to be arbitrary orders. She’s sure he’s paying her little mind. Bravado is infectious; she knows more than one angel who’s festered under it, but she’s never been so foolish.

The Captain pays her little mind, and she pays little mind to him in turn. Her focus is instead on the crew he reprimands. Importance is in the details, after all, and the details include her getting the ship to port prior to the scheduled drop off. Chaos can – and shall – strike once they land.

They slow under the shade of the largest mast, the Captain taking time to re-tie the bandanna under his hat. While he does, Michael cranes her neck to check the mariners dotting the lines above. 

Beelzebub, Michael can’t help but think when she spots the demon among the rope, should never have been restricted to the cloistered caverns of Hell. This is, of course, from a purely anatomical standpoint. Beelzebub moves with a startling grace through the rigging of the ship, tiny form skittering up beams and skimming across ropes with a deftness that threatens to divulge the aerial nature of her true self.

“You may be new to the sea, but you should know it’s slim pickings out here,” the Captain says gruffly. Michael keeps her shoulders steadily relaxed, eyes cool as they skirt over the sails. “Can’t judge for anything, he’s got the body ta’ turn any man.”

“Don’t be crass,” she can’t help but say, schooling her voice carefully back to force a joke. “Is this not a religious mission?”

The Captain grunts a laugh, crudely sketching a cross across his chest, eyes rolled rather than raised upwards. “Praise be,” he says, then gestures to his cabin. “Fancy a round of His blood?”

**-**

They take to sitting at the same table together during meals. They don’t talk much, because they are both known for being quiet and rigid and apathetic. Neither of them, she knows, minds. It is a relief to be focused on only one thing, to be in a space where no one cares for her and she cares for the fate of no one. Her skin sticks to her clothes, her hair is a mass of sweat under her cap, and the food is dreadful, but her plan is straightforward.

At dinner one night, Beelzebub swirls her spoon through a mound of stale rice and nothing else, almost smiling. Michael stares at her for a moment, weighs the intention of that smile.

“What is it?” she finally asks, less reluctant than she should be. Beelzebub’s eyes flick up under her lashes.

“They’re out of onion,” she says, spoon still dragging through the rice. “The stock rot through.”

“Kitchen duty is not among your roles,” she says, cold and sharp because this is not according to plan.

But Beelzebub shakes her head, turns the smile to her. “No,” she agrees, “I’m too valuable with the ropes for that. The flies must’ve been drawn to me,” she says, gesturing vaguely.

Michael stays cold and sharp, gaze tearing like knife through sails. “I would think,” she says stiffly, “After all, you have such steady hands.”

The spoon drops, Beelzebub’s fingers going limp. Her face is held carefully neutral.

“Cruel,” she says, too quiet to be appreciative.

When Michael says nothing, Beelzebub begins to pile their plates, adding a belated, “and hypocritical,” through still lips.

“Especially coming from you,” is not said.

-

Michael has no need for sleep, so she offers most of her evenings to stand guard or maintain course. It should be suspicious, she thinks, but humans are greedy. No one questions how little she sleeps.

She passes the crows nest often at night. She knows Beelzebub sleeps in it – or at the very least, spends her nights in it. She doesn’t ask; she leaves her to the silent blanket that is the sky instead.

There is no reason to seek out the demon.

It isn’t until they stop sitting together at meals that she takes to pausing under the nest on the nights she busies herself with rounds. Beelzebub and her many eyes notice quickly, which shouldn’t – and doesn’t – surprise her.

She’d bought a pipe with an ivory handle before they’d set off. It would be a challenge to keep clean without using miracles, she’d known, but she liked the irony of a pristine white set against slowly wasting teeth. 

A voice rings out before she can light it below the crows nest.

“Satan has no mercy,” it groans, then sighs, calling out, “If you wanttttt up here, put it out.”

“For a demon, you don’t like fire,” she replies. But she does put it up, carefully wrapping it into her coat pocket before ascending. It’s difficult, her tall frame unwieldy where handholds are small and clustered unequally, but a true warrior must master all terrain.

Beelzebub shrugs when she swings a leg over the banister, hand flickering absentmindedly at the flies hovering about her head.

“Yes,” Michael acknowledges, settling beside her. The galaxy beats down upon them, sky alight with stars, and she says, equally absentminded, somewhat breathy, “It’s always caused more harm than good, hasn’t it?”

Beelzebub falters at that, mouth slightly opened and no sound coming out. It breaks Michael out of her stupor.

“I - ” Michael says, then bites at her tongue.

_I’m sorry_ , she wants to say, _For doing this, over and over again._ But she doesn’t. The boat creaks under them, the waves lash around them, the stars blink down at them, and they say nothing.

Their perch, she thinks, isn’t steady, is dangerous, but she can still somehow imagine that soft, sweet cherub in her place. She’s watched him, some, and she knows enough about him to admit that he’s smarter, smoother than they think. She laid out many rules, boundaries without room for freedom, but these are only boundaries, not chains. There is still allowance for movement, and the only entities that truly understand Her, she thinks, are those that can think. Michael knows that he is smart, and swift, and strong, and so, so sharp, but he is edged with the sharp of paper rather than the sharp of a sword. 

Not that Gabriel can tell any of these differences. Mouthpieces and figureheads are like that, she thinks as she glances towards the Captain’s quarters. All talk, no doing.

She closes her eyes, head tilting back to bump against the banister.

Then Beelzebub shifts besides her, nods slightly, murmurs, “I always liked the heat.”

“It is nice out,” Michael agrees, turning to look at the demon.

“It really is,” Beelzebub says without need, hand drifting to the top of Michael’s thigh.

-

They encounter privateers the next morning. The calm of the ocean she’d thought would aid their travels slows them when the other boat dots the horizon; they aren’t able to outrun it, nor are they able to circumvent it. It’s as though they were waiting. 

She wouldn’t be surprised if they were. When Michael looks up to check the process of securing the sails, Beelzebub’s eyes cut quickly away from her. She can’t fault the demon, she supposes. It is in her nature.

Despite throwing off her plans, Michael is almost glad when the first of the other ship on-boards. The sword is a solid comfort in her hands, feet planted firmly and shoulders neatly squared. 

She throws back her head after driving her blade through the spine of a broad-backed man, laughs and inhales the cannon smoke weighing heavy in the air. There is blood on her shirt and blood on her fingers and blood in her hair and even though the beings at her feet are only human, power thrums thick through her essence. Gabriel was made to rest easy at his desk, Aziraphale was made to charm his way through Earth, but her?

The rules of the game may have changed in the past millennium, but she was made for _this_.

As she swipes the blade across another man’s throat, Beelzebub folds back-to-back against her.

“We almost done here?” she grits out, and Michael grins more than she frowns. 

“I couldn’t say,” she replies, honest because she didn’t mean for this to occur. Beelzebub shudders against her in response, hands clenched around a knife that she tiredly pulls from a man’s chest with a sickening tear of flesh. 

This gives Michael pause. Beelzebub, she knows, has the strength to summon hordes of flies, hordes of locusts, hordes of plague. The weak presence at her back gives her pause, gives time for the smoke to cloister delicious – but _heavy_ – in the back of her throat.

_Oh_ , she thinks, then doesn’t think as she steps one foot back between Beelzebub’s legs, bracing them together.

Beelzebub lets out a quiet, shaky laugh that distracts Michael just long enough – _of course_ – for the blunt end of an axe to crunch against the side of her head.

-

She comes to on the kitchen table, head heavier than the wood. The ache of her body is no matter, but her forehead pounds. It’s too much to think about the greater plans that have always come so easily to her, to think about improvisation and tracks that need to be returned to. It’s too much to think about her role, really, either, about her existence and how she could salvage herself.

Instead, she opens her eyes, breathes deep, unnecessary breaths that somehow help to clear her. Her stomach roils but she can tell the ceiling of the mess, the hard dig of the table under her back, the crash of the waves against the hull. She can also hear the muffled sounds of metal being laid down, of water being wrung into a bucket.

“You’re up,” a voice says. It doesn’t sound like a good or a bad thing, which makes sense to Michael’s addled mind once Beelzebub’s head pops into her frame of view.

Even like this, she knows not to ask what or how or why. Whether she’s capable is a different story, but she knows who she is and who Beelzebub is and who they are. 

“You’re quiet,” Beelzebub huffs, rolls her eyes. She takes a wet rag and lays it against Michael’s forehead, fingers faltering almost tender against her temple. “Does it hurt?”

Michael doesn’t realize she’s tilted her head into Beelzebub’s touch until the demon draws back. “Mm,” she murmurs, eyes slitting to follow the pull of Beelzebub’s fingers.

Beelzebub is careful not to pay her more attention than necessary, nodding and standing. “The cook has something for that,” she says, Michael watching as she goes to rifle through the cupboards. Though she’s awkward in the kitchen, uncomfortable around produce so easy to rot, she moves with ease through the cabinets. It reminds Michael of a healer from long ago, one low enough on the totem pole to have never been of any importance in Great Plans but high enough to have been blessed as an assistant of Raphael.

When she returns with a salve meant to spread thick over temples, Michael is sure to stay still under her touch. She can’t help but imagine Beelzebub and healing magics, ones that had been seared from every crevice of her essence, burned to the point where her body could harbor only rot and flies, plagues boiling deep in her belly. She winces, and Beelzebub pulls back again.

“Don’t act like a human,” she says, softer than she should be. “This is the best you’re getting. Wouldn’t want to alert either of our sides with any cross-miracles.”

“You are,” Michael says, not entirely sure of her words although she thinks she sounds assuring, “Healing me.”

She knows who she is, she knows who Beelzebub is, but parsing their roles is far too much. They’re stupid, she thinks, and reaches a clumsy arm out. It fumbles, flops more over the edge of the table than it rises into the air. Beelzebub is impossibly stiff when she finally reaches out to assist.

“You deserve a miracle for that,” she says without letting go. She lets Michael’s hand stumble its way up her arm, across her shoulder, around her jaw. She lets herself be drawn down, lets Michael’s deep breathing wash over her cheeks. Her eyes are lifted to the Heaven’s, as though praying for God to see what the angel has wrought. But she does lower them when she moves to meet Michael halfway.

Beelzebub’s lips are sticky with salt and human grit. Michael’s own are no better, the tang of blood still lingering between her teeth.

“It doesn’t hurt,” she tries to say into the kiss, because time is never and forever and the clock is making even less sense than it ever has. But her words make Beelzebub pull away, hands lingering to cradle Michael’s head.

“The cook would better know what to do,” Beelzebub says before she leaves.

-

She miracles herself after Beelzebub leaves, then maintains a calculated distance. It’s as easy as it was the first time in a space where they have such separate roles. Even so, she can feel Beelzebub’s gaze pulling at her whenever her focus is turned.

It is heavy and it is _not_ reciprocated. She looks to the rigging often, but she does so for her job and her job alone. Sometimes, she will admit, she wonders why Beelzebub is here when she catches sight of the demon’s form. 

But that is still for her job. 

-

From the steer, the Captain peers across the deck. He hums appreciatively while Michael keeps her gaze steady on the navigation, away from the sails, Down towards the sea. She doesn’t look up when he begins to stretch, elbows crooked as his hands press into his back, chest puffing up, head lolling back, he with all the languid bravado of an ill-groomed house cat. 

She knows what drew him, so she doesn’t give in to the roll of her eyes.

“The boy,” he grunts, spine still arched. She imagines it is just as uncomfortable for him as it is for her. “Dramatic, was he? Wouldn’t expect it of him, but I know your type. You wouldn’t like that.”

He doesn’t, but she shrugs at him in a way she knows he will continue to misinterpret. His teeth are white when he bares them in what should be a smile.

“Well,” he says around a laugh, “Can’t say I’m one for attachment, but I do like a bit of flare in them.”

“Awfully attached to a turned head,” she says before her mind can catch her mouth. When he stills, she shifts onto the flats of her feet, ready.

“Turn your head,” he says, attempting something cool. Though his face flushes, the heat doesn’t get to him before he can finish. “To the inventory.”

She doesn’t quite respect him, but she leaves without another word. 

-

Beelzebub was right; the onions had been beset by rot. They are mush now, pooling viscous in their crates, cracks in the wood long-clogged by mold. Wet heat rolls off of them, one that she can’t help inhale. Though she doesn’t have to, her job calls for it. 

It is a wet heat, and the flies bathing in the fleshy, vegetal mucus should be hers, but Michael knows they are not. Mere coincidence; Beelzebub did not do this.

“I applaud you,” Michael says, “For your show of control.” The door to the supply creaks shut behind her as Beelzebub steps fully inside. Some greater purpose, Michael knows, having called her in turn to judge, jury, executioner. 

Beelzebub doesn’t speak. Michael hums in acquiesce. 

“There is an imbalance now, of course,” Michael says, “I would apologize for my accusation, but that would further tip the scales in our favor.”

“You’re angry,” Beelzbub says. “What wrong did you do?” 

Michael sighs heavily. “And our swords cross,” she says. But she does agree. “I did react badly, but it was not uncalled for. There is a hypocrisy in him.”

“You would know,” Beelzebub says, dull. Michael frowns, a pressure battering the side of her head in response. It was not meant to be personal.

It is not personal.

“I suppose,” she muses, ignoring the swell of pressure, “That I reacted so badly because he was right. Your attachment, after all, is not something I ought put up with.”

Beelzebub stares, unblinking. “Demons,” she says, still dull, “Must be cruel. You angels do so needlessly.” 

Michael snorts. “We merely speak the truth.”

“You don’t,” she replies. “It is true that I am attached to you. To Her. Do you know what it feels like, having your wings split sixfold? Having to learn flight over and over again by building scar tissue over that which has been torn and burnt and broken into a buzz?”

Beelzebub eyes do not shimmer, the room quiet, a tunnel, a vacuum. Michael could swat her, crush her in this moment. She does.

“Almighty,” she breathes, laugh a whistle, “I pray for your desperation.”

“I damn yours,” Beelzebub says, “I damn yours, I damn your control, I damn this thing you have created, this communication, this toxicity, this destruction, this death She gifted you, I damn your control. I damn you, hypocrite.”

“You damn my destruction?” she asks, laugh a vortex, “Please. My job benefits you _just_ as much as it does me.”

“I don’t damn your job, I don’t care for your job,” she says. Though the demon doesn’t shout, something like blood-lust bubbles in Michael’s chest, the feeling of a dirty fight well-won. “I am just trying to do _mine,_ why won’t you _leave me be._ ”

“Demon,” Michael starts. Beelzebub doesn’t let her finish. 

“No,” she says, voice breaking. It does not heal, but it does solidify, so very dull. “No, no, this _thing_ you’ve done to us, this isn’t that, this is _attachment_ . This is _needless_. This is -”

“Stop,” Michael says, “I couldn’t choose this.” 

“Oh Archangel, fair and true,” Beelzebub mocks, laugh a desert, “Archangel, virtue and justice, why-ever were you assigned this job, so beneath your place? Archangel, Archangel, what Greater Plans did She assign you?”

Michael imagines dry rot belaying her skin. Yearns for wet rot, anything to dampen the heat. A buzz isn’t healing, but it brings comfort. 

“I wish you’d done this,” Michael wants to say. Her lips make to part, but Beelzebub ignores her, dull hook catching deep.

“Did you - no, of course not, another mistake by me,” she spits, “Did She know who of us would have to respond?”

“We cannot know why She does the things that she does,” Michael makes to reply, throat chopping around repetition. Beelzebub leaves before she can finish.

-

They cut through the bay on black waves, sky pitched with ash in their wake. They herald their arrival with the guns and steel and blood Gabriel would never touch. Michael, first mate, their true command, screams from the bow and they spill from the rafts, blazing and glorious onto the docks. 

She has to follow them. She wants to follow them. She can taste the sweat of the traitor priest, can feel the tremor of his hands as he prays to a God past listening. 

But he isn’t why she’s here, and someone else is still with her on the deck. 

“Does it not bother you?” she asks, smoke heady on her tongue. Beelzebub nods.

“I knew what I was getting into,” she replies. “And the air is damp enough. I’ll survive.”

Michael crosses the deck with more care than she’s ever held a sword.

“Perhaps I had thought of,” she can’t bring herself to say it, so she gestures weakly. Beelzebub sighs. “But did you really keep such an eye on me to know?”

She attempts to tease, though she knows it falls flat. The hem of Beelzebub’s sleeve flutters near her wrist. 

But no corners are cut, no side paths are taken; the salve is laid on thick. Beelzebub loops her fingers through Michael’s. Attachment, desperation, Michael tries not to think.

“I suppose,” she replies. Tired or resigned or accepting, Michael isn’t sure. “You know I’ll come. Mine follow the Great Plan, too.”

“Of course,” Michael says. 

“I’d like that,” Michael does not say.

**Author's Note:**

> Y’all expected a badass Beez/Michael fight scene? Y’all expected that gay, cinematic shit? Well God fills all the boxes on those meme charts where it’s like fucks to survive/evades taxes/war crimes/hates the irish so we get the irony of Michael Immediately getting clocked. It’s the homophobia box babes. 
> 
> But don’t worry, I’m also homophobic so there’s not even a satisfying ending! Kisses xoxo


End file.
